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1 No. 566 



AMERICAN NEUTRALITY 



AN APPEAL 



PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES 



CITIZENS OF THE REPUBLIC, REQUEST- 
ING THEIR ASSISTANCE IN MAINTAIN- 
ING A STATE OF NEUTRALITY DURING 
THE PRESENT EUROPEAN WAR 







PRESENTED BY MR. CHILTON 
AUGUST 19 (calendar day, AUGUST 20), 1914. — Ordered to be printed 



WASHINGTON 

GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE 

1914 






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AMERICAN NEUTRALITY. 



statement of the president. 

My Felllow Countrymen : 

I suppose that every thoughtful man in America has asked him- 
self, during these last troubled weeks, what influence the European 
war may exert upon the United States, and I take the liberty of ad- 
dressing a few words to you in order to point out that it is entirely 
within our own choice what its effects upon us will be and to urge 
very earnestly upon you the sort of speech and conduct which will 
best safeguard the Nation against distress and disaster. 

The effect of the war upon the United States will depend upon 
what American citizens say and do. Every man who really loves 
America will act and speak in the true spirit of neutrality, which is 
the spirit of impartiality and fairness and friendliness to all con- 
cerned. The spirit of the Nation in this critical matter will be de- 
termined largely by what individuals and society and those gathered 
in public meetings do and say, upon what newspapers and magazines 
contain, upon what ministers utter in their pulpits, and men proclaim 
as their opinions on the street. 

The people of the United States are drawn from many nations, and 
chiefly from the nations now at war. It is natural and inevitable 
that there should be the utmost variety of sympathy and desire among 
them with regard to the issues and circumstances of the conflict. 
Some will wish one nation, others another, to succeed in the mo- 
mentous struggle. It will be easy to excite passion and difficult to 
allay it. Those responsible for exciting it will assume a heavy re- 
sponsibility, responsibility for no less a thing than that the people 
of the United States, whose love of their country and whose loyalty 
to its Government should unite them as Americans all, bound in 
honor and affection to think first of her and her interests, may be 
divided in camps of hostile opinion, hot against each other, involved 
in the war itself in impulse and opinion if not in action. 

Such divisions among us would be fatal to our peace of mind and 
might seriously stand in the way of the proper performance of our 
duty as the one great nation at peace, the one people holding itself 
ready to play a part of impartial mediation and speak the counsels 
of peace and accommodation, not as a partisan, but as a friend. 

I venture, therefore, my fellow countrymen, to speak a solemn 
word of warning to you against that deepest, most subtle, most essen- 
tial breach of neutrality which may spring out of partisanship, out 
of passionately taking sides. The United States must be neutral in 
fact as well as in name during these days that are to try men's souls. 
We must be impartial in thought as well as in action, must put a 
curb upon our sentiments as well as upon every transaction that 



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AMERICAN NEUTRALITY. 



might be construed as a preference of one party to the struggle before 
another. 

My thought is of America. I am speaking, I feel sure, the earnest 
wish and purpose of every thoughtful American that this great coun- 
try of ours, which is, of course, the first in our thoughts and in our 
hearts, should show herself in this time of peculiar trial a Nation fit 
beyond others to exhibit the fine poise of undisturbed judgment, the 
dignity of self-control, the efficiency of dispassionate action ; a Nation 
that neither sits in judgment upon others nor is disturbed in her own 
counsels and which keeps herself fit and free to do what is, honest and 
disinterested and truly serviceable for the peace of the world. 

Shall we not resolve to put upon ourselves the restraints which will 
bring to our people the happiness and the great and lasting influence 
for peace we covet for them? 

o 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



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